Don Markus of the Baltimore Sun has a long column on Tuesday about how Maryland athletic director Kevin Anderson deserves far more criticism than he gets, especially for last year's disastrous season for the football team. The column itself isn't particularly remarkable (though it isn't wrong), relying on the derivative "AD hired the coach!" point of view. That is, except for this one revelation.
From what I hear, hiring Crowton was Anderson’s idea. Edsall really wanted to hire Joe Moorhead, his offensive coordinator at Connecticut. He was told that he needed a hire to create some buzz to quiet the criticism Anderson received for bringing in a meat-and-potatoes tactician such as Edsall when you have the ACC’s reigning ACC rookie of the year returning at quaterback. That worked out well.
That's pretty damming of Anderson, if true. It also seems a bit extreme. Would Anderson really force his coach to hire someone he didn't want based simply on buzz? There has to be more to this, even if one believes Anderson really is incompetent.